ALOI, Mr Sam, Private Capacity [by audio link]

CONDELLO, Ms Gabriella, Private Capacity [by audio link]

GAYED, Mr Andrew, Private Capacity [by audio link]

[14:00]

CHAIR: Welcome. Before we continue, is there anything you wish to say about the capacity in which you appear today?

Ms Condello : I am a resident of Rossmore, and I'm here on behalf of the Wianamatta South Creek Precinct and Rossmore Precinct residents.

Mr Aloi : I'm part of Wianamatta South Creek and also a resident.

Mr Gayed : I'm a resident of Rossmore along the Wianamatta South Creek border.

CHAIR: Would one or all of you like to make a short opening statement for the committee?

Ms Condello : It's a collective approach, if that's okay? I'll start off first, if that's alright?

CHAIR: That's perfectly fine.

Ms Condello : Thank you so much. Firstly, as I mentioned, I am a longstanding resident of Rossmore. I have been here for some time. I'm also a member of the community liaison group. I do need to make that announcement. I am part of that committee. We meet monthly with the director, Andrew Jackson, and through the planning partnerships as well. I'd like to thank you for meeting with us and giving us this opportunity to talk to you and hear our views. Much of what we've got to say has been raised already, but what we're raising are our own personal views and experiences as well.

Secondly, I'd like to highlight that there is a bit of a general consensus that we are in support of change and development. We want change and development; however, we do love our rural lifestyle. We appreciate that progress at times becomes necessary, and that's okay. The issue is more about the process, the timeliness and the zoning of land from RU4—or whatever it previously was—to E and R, without just, fair and reasonable compensation or even an appropriate time frame for acquisition for residents who have been affected by the E and R zoning. We acknowledge there are certain positives around the need for development. There is a need for a second airport. It's going to lead to increased jobs in the Western Sydney area. That's great. There'll be no need to travel to the city. I remember distinctly having to wake up at 5 am to do that when I worked in the city, and I wasn't alone. The train station and other infrastructure, such as Bringelly Road and the fast-tracking of Fifteenth Avenue through Austral and Rossmore to the Aerotropolis core, are all great incentives and initiatives that are going to happen and are happening currently.

But the impact of this whole Aerotropolis process and the new airport is quite significant. It's huge. There are significant, key issues that I, Sam and Andrew will be raising. Some of them were quite diligently raised by Ms Zucco and Mrs Markuse earlier today. You've got land along the Wianamatta South Creek in Rossmore where they had 100 per cent of their land zoned as E and R, whereas before it had been RU4. It was just by a stroke of a pen. There was no consultation, no courtesy email that you're about to have your land rezoned. There was nothing. It was: here's the announcement; there you go—basically, bad luck. That's devastating. Most of the residents along the Wianamatta South Creek in this area, in Rossmore, are business owners, and Sam and Andrew will talk to you some more about that impact for them.

I personally have seen the devastation. Whilst I'm strong, I'm very sensitive. I've personally experienced residents collapsing from sheer distress, right in my arms, at a public general meeting. I asked a total stranger, 'Are you okay?' She just said no and burst into tears. How do you support someone you don't even know? You've just got to hug them. This was during COVID, but I thought, 'Bugger it.' This poor woman needed a hug and she was bawling her eyes out, because their property on the other side, still within the aerotropolis precinct, was fully affected.

This is a wider issue. It's affecting many residents. Some in the older age group, such as my parents' age group, are in their 70s and needing to retire. Some can't now, because it's like, 'Well, this was our retirement package and we can no longer quit work.' Some have already retired but their property was their super, and it's been rendered valueless. So there are a lot of issues for a lot of residents around the E and R process and the timeliness of that.

I would like to state that my parents' property isn't affected by the Wianamatta South Creek zone yet. But it's a constant worry and it's a constant stress. Is it by a hairline that we could be or that we may not be? We're hoping we aren't. But does this mean I should stop helping the other residents? Absolutely not. I think Mrs Zucco quite eloquently raised her position around that, and I support her stance. My parents have been here for 54 years—or 52 years; I could have that number wrong—and, like many of the other older generation residents, have seen changes. They bought their land as part of a superannuation package. Yet for many residents whose land is now E and R, it's no longer their superannuation; they can't do anything with it.

When you look at probity planning and all that sort of stuff, and the future risk assessments that are going on, there's lots happening that I'm not completely au fait with; I'm still updating myself. There's been an attempt to introduce a flood study. While technology's wonderful, there needs to be mitigation work done that hasn't been done. We've seen major changes with the development of the Western Sydney airport. My dad has an engineering background just from driving past the airport. The sheer fact is they've raised and flattened that land to such a degree. In taking out numerous trees and fauna, and with what they've done to the wildlife, is it an offset? Has the new land that was once RU4 now been zoned as E and R? Is that how they've offset that development, just with privately owned land? There are so many anomalies and so many unanswered questions that are unfair. Sam and Andrew will go into that a bit more. There are just no answers, and that's the stressful part. What's happening with that? How are they doing the biodiversity offset? Is it just privately owned land that has been impacted? We can't get answers to that at all.

What's happening with infrastructure? There need to be upgrades. Rossmore has experienced very limited upgrades to infrastructure. It's coming, and there are maps around saying: 'Hey, you're getting all these wonderful roads.' But guess what? You can't do anything if you want to do something, because those roads are there. I've asked for more detailed maps, because the department has them, and I've been told point blank, 'No, you can't have those detailed maps.' I say, 'But it's about my property.' They say, 'Yes, but you can't have those detailed maps, sorry.' So we have to stand in limbo. I'm probably one of many people who have had that response. That being said, I might hand over to Sam, who might have a little bit more to add to that.

Mr Aloi : Good afternoon. I just want to talk about our personal experience of what's happened to us. I'm 58 years old, and I've worked all my life. We bought our property in Rossmore about 20 years ago. It was RU4 developable land. We set up a hydroponic greenhouse business on there for my family's future, knowing what we could do with it.

We've been doing this so-called precinct and arguing back and forth with planning for the last three years. I think everyone has submission overload and fatigue at the moment with what's been happening and the flood studies and the whole scenario—I won't go into all the details—with the basics of the whole aerotropolis core and the new airport. May I say that most of us are not against this. We all understand the development and we want this to be a great place to live. It is a great place to live. It's rural. It's beautiful. It's going to be a good place in the future—there's no doubt about that at all.

There have been a lot of theories regarding what's going to happen with all the precincts. My property runs along the South Creek at the rear and on the eastern side. Some people call it a creek. It is a creek sometimes, but it is mainly a creek when there's a rain event. I can jump across it sometimes, so, really, the creek is on my property.

In planning a part of the new precinct, New South Wales planning stated that they're going to clean the creek and make it a liveable waterway. They said it's the 'green spine' for the new city where workers families can go to for recreation in parklands et cetera. They said that it would be a beautiful place for people to live and work. Fast forward to 20 October 2020: wow, we got 100 per cent E and R zoning. What does that mean? The green spine, the so-called lifeline to the city, has just paralysed us. We've had our umbilical cord severed. How can this happen without government knowing what would actually happen to all the small-land owners and businesses? There's no policy in place on how E and R zoning would be paid for.

No-one wants to buy our land. I know Andrew's property is for sale, and he'll go on to that. Not even one person has actually come to him and said they want to buy his E and R land. No-one wants to buy it. No developer wants to buy it, because they can't develop it, so why would they buy it? It's left us totally sterilised, and it's causing us a lot of stress and mental health issues. It's getting to all of us at the moment. Like I said, no-one is against development; we're just against the ad hoc, non-transparent, no policy for small-land owners. They're just looking after the large-land owners, as everyone has previously said. That seems to be very true.

So what happens to us now? With the E and R zoning in this setting, it means that no homes or businesses can be there, so what do we do? What's the way out for us, as small-land owners affected in some percentage by E and R zoning? My street with 10 or 11 properties along the Wianamatta South Creek are all 100 per cent E and R zoned. So what do we do? The only way that anyone would buy us is through an acquisition. The government surely must have realised this. Going through all the acquisition processes and what's happening with the metro and the Orchard Hills people, it's bastardry. It's terrible. This is not the right thing to do.

I believe there are about 320 landowners along the Wianamatta South Creek that are affected in various ways. Some are E and R zoned and some are mixtures. For us, we don't know where to turn anymore. Like I said, the creek only flows when there's a rain event, so I'm wondering how they're going to clean the creek. No mitigation has been done. How wide is the creek going to be? How will it affect my property? I know that in detailed planning there are some walkways going through and a sewer coming. No-one can talk to us about anything, so it's really left us feeling pretty upset, I'm afraid to say. Our livelihood is going and no-one wants to help us. And no-one can give us a timetable. How can we sit here for the next 30 years like they did for the airport previously? I want to get on with my life. I'm 58 years of age. I want to sell up and move and have a better life. All we want is fairness and transparency. We want a timetable for when, how, and what policy they're going to put in place for developers or stakeholders to buy a property—because no-one else is going to buy us. Even if they buy 50 properties for the next five years until the airport opens, it certainly gives us some opportunity. Hopefully, that's what they'll do. We just need some transparency. That's all I've got to say.

CHAIR: It's absolutely understandable that, in these circumstances, people in your shoes would be finding this very difficult. I appreciate very much your evidence today. Mr Gayed, do you want to add to those opening statements?

Mr Gayed : I think Sam and Gabriella have hit the nail on the head. If we cast our minds to when this all began, originally our properties were zoned as non-urban. This caused quite a ruckus in the community. No-one really knew what this meant and what was happening to our properties. How could we be non-urban after living so many years on the land? A lot of the submissions were to that effect. That's where a lot of the emotion comes from. As Sam demonstrated, from the beginning we've been typecast as this unwanted plot of land that nothing will be done about. There won't be an acquisition process. You're just going to be classed as non-urban,. That then turns into environmental and recreational, but nothing more eventuates from there.

There are a couple more points that I want to touch on quickly. My property borders South Creek, as does Sam's. We live opposite Gabrielle's property, on May Avenue. We have had our property on the market for quite a while, with no inquiries at all because of the classification. This is in stark contrast to properties one street away, which are going for multiple times what the landowners purchased them for and multiple times what they could even imagine they were worth.

I also want to point out that, across the other side of the creek from us, the properties behind us where the creek separates our property, for some reason or another, haven't had the turmoil that we've gone through. Only three-quarters of their property can be developed and only a quarter of it can be zoned as environmental. That seems baffling to us. We submitted a lot of expert reports and consultant reports to show that we can do the same thing as the other side. The submissions we put to the department of planning and to the council were completely ignored and not addressed. We commissioned our own slab studies and we have combined slab studies with all of May Avenue to show that there are alternative paths. These are expert reports. They are not emotional. They are not invested in coming from another angle. They really showed that the department's and the council's reports were lacking a lot of historical data and a lot of information. Again, they were completely ignored. So there's a lot of frustration from landowners, myself included. We have no voice. We don't have the political power or pull that some of the larger landowners have. So we're just ignored, even though we're doing everything the correct way. That really makes us feel as though we are in hardship. Even though we want to be heard, we want the development and we want the area to progress, we're just treated as a by-product or as a nuisance that can just be ignored. And, going to Sam and Gabriella's point, why can't there be transparency around acquisition? That's about all I have to say.

CHAIR: Thanks, Mr Gayed. It is clear, from the evidence we've heard and seen so far today, there's a very significant difference between the treatment of large land-holding interests and small landholders around the airport. We've seen, of course—it's been discussed today but also in previous estimates and in hearings of this committee—the Leppington Triangle purchase, where a very significant amount of public money, 10 times the value of the property, was expended to purchase a parcel of land off a very large land-holding interest in the area. We heard evidence just 20 minutes ago that confirms what's on the public record already: that Minister Taylor, at least, had meetings with large land-holding interests around the airport and these interests subsequently received preferential treatment. There's been evidence at estimates that representatives of large land-holding interests, some of whom have been assisted by Mr Daryl Maguire, who's the subject of ICAC proceedings in New South Wales, had private meetings with officials of the department—those who are in a position to make decisions about how parcels of land are treated and dealt with—and subsequently received preferential treatment.

In your experience of engagement with the department or the airport, have you been offered any of that sort of access or any of that sort of preferential treatment?

Mr Aloi : None.

Mr Gayed : Absolutely not.

Ms Condello : None of us. I don't know if this has ever been brought up, but, about three years ago, when this all came about, the department had a public exhibition at the Bringelly community hall around what was to happen. At that time, I was aware of a group of residents—I won't name names, because I haven't spoken to them directly. I understand that there was a negotiation over a huge amount of money—we're talking about quite a few million dollars. As a result of the exhibition, 'Turning land into non-urban land'—that's what it was called at the time; it's now called 'Environmental and recreation', which is the same thing but with a different title—that deal fell through. It was worth millions. These are people who are personal friends of my parents and personal friends of other people. They lost millions. The response I got from the person I broached that with was: 'Oh, yeah. So? That's why we've issued this: we wanted that to stop. Big deal.' I'm quoting that person directly. He is in the department, and he's been given many a promotion. It's disgusting. Yet we have major landowners, and their land is a case for development.

CHAIR: So you're saying that the zoning's been used as a tool to reduce the cost of purchases?

Ms Condello : Yes, I guess that's one way of looking at it.

CHAIR: I don't have any more questions. It doesn't indicate for me anything but that your submissions really do tell the story beyond the question that I just asked. Senator Chandler, do you have any questions of these witnesses?

Senator CHANDLER: All good. Thank you, Chair.

CHAIR: I thank each of you for your evidence today and wish you all the very best in what appears to be a very difficult and uncertain path forward. I thank all witnesses who have given evidence to the committee today. Thanks also to broadcasting and Hansard.

Committee adjourned at 14 : 25